Will Yankees’ Pineda have Rays’ number?
The Bronx Bombers are on an absolute tear away from Yankee Stadium, and they’re excited to have Alex Rodriguez back in the saddle.
New York takes aim at its seventh consecutive road victory in this afternoon’s contest against Tampa Bay, with a 4:10 p.m. ET first pitch in South Florida. Oddsmakers at online sports book Bovada.lv nonetheless list the Rays as 1.5-run favorites. Joe Girardi’s gang enters as a -106 underdog, while the over/under figure sits at 7.5 runs.
After missing nearly three weeks due to a strained right hamstring, Rodriguez is falling right in line with the rest of the Yanks’ scorching sluggers. The 14-time All-Star jacked his 693rd career homer in yesterday’s 4-1 triumph. Carlos Beltran, moving from designated hitter to right field in order to accommodate Rodriguez’s return, also tacked on his 11th dinger of the campaign.
Michael Pineda (2-5, 6.34 ERA) probably needs more than a couple of bombs to prevail in several hours. The righty continues to struggle in his third season in Pinstripes, going 1-4 with a 7.43 ERA in the past five starts. He got rocked by the Rays on April 24, too, yielding seven runs and 10 hits across five innings of an 8-1 defeat.
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Luckily for Pineda, counterpart Matt Moore’s (1-3, 5.47) been similarly woeful of late. Kevin Cash’s southpaw has failed to register an out in the sixth in four straight appearances. Clearly, that’s a bad recipe for a New York lineup that does nothing but work deep counts at present.
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